1.07 PPoint Lecture

PART 1
FUNDAMENTALS
Chapter 7
Scale and Proportion
Copyright © 2011 Thames & Hudson

Chapter 7 Scale and Proportion
PART 1
FUNDAMENTALS
Introduction
 We perceive scale in relation to our own size
 Art objects created on a monumental scale appear larger than they
would be in normal life
 Art objects created on a human scale correspond to the size of
things as they actually exist
 Small-scale objects appear smaller than our usual experience of
them in the real world
 Usually, an artist ensures that all the parts of an object are

in proportion to one another
 But discordant proportions can express specific meanings
Gateways to Art: Understanding the Visual Arts, Debra J DeWitte, Ralph M Larmann, M Kathryn Shields Copyright © 2011 Thames & Hudson
PART 1
FUNDAMENTALS
Scale
 Artist and designers make conscious choices about the
scale of their work when they consider the message they
want to put across
 A small-scale work implies intimacy
 Large-scale works can be experienced by groups of viewers
and usually communicate big ideas directed at a large
audience
 Practical considerations can affect an artist's decision
about scale too
 Cost, time it will take to execute the piece, and demands that
a specific location may place on the work are all factors
PART 1
FUNDAMENTALS
Scale and Meaning

 Usually a monumental scale indicates heroism or other
epic virtues
 War monuments, for example, often feature figures much
larger than life-size in order to convey the bravery of the
warriors
PART 1
FUNDAMENTALS
Interactive Exercises:
Scale and Meaning
Click to start the Interactive Exercises
1.126 Claes Oldenburg and
Coosje van Bruggen, Mistos
(Match Cover), 1992. Steel,
aluminum, fiber-reinforced
plastic, painted with
polyurethane enamel, 68' x
33' x 43' 4”. Collection La
Vall d'Hebron, Barcelona,
Spain
PART 1
FUNDAMENTALS
Claes Oldenburg and Coosje van Bruggen,

Mistos (Match Cover)
 Uses monumental scale to poke fun while expressing

admiration for the little things of everyday life
 Oldenburg transforms the essence of everyday things as he
magnifies their sculptural form
 Oldenburg believes that the items of mass culture, no
matter how insignificant they might seem, express a truth
about modern life
1.127 Robert Lostutter, The Hummingbirds, 1981. Watercolor on paper, 1 ¾ x 5 5/8”. Collection of Anne and Warren Weisberg
PART 1
FUNDAMENTALS
Robert Lostutter,
The Hummingbirds
 Lostutter uses small scale to enhance the character of his
work
 He likes to create his works on the scale not of a human
but of a bird
 The tiny scale of the work—only one person at a time can
see it properly—forces us to come closer
 Viewing it becomes an intimate experience
PART 1
FUNDAMENTALS
Hierarchical Scale
 Hierarchical scale refers to the deliberate use of relative
size in a work of art, in order to communicate differences
in importance
 Almost always, larger means more important, and smaller
means less important
PART 1
FUNDAMENTALS
Hierarchical Scale
1.128 Relief from the northern wall of the hypostyle hall at the great temple of Amun, 19 th Dynasty, c. 1295–1186 BCE. Karnak, Egypt
A
Hierarchical scale
PART 1
FUNDAMENTALS
Hierarchical scale: Relief from the

northern wall of the hypostyle hall at the
great temple of Amun
 In the art of ancient Egypt, the king, or pharaoh, was
usually the largest figure depicted because he had the
highest status in the social order
 This scene depicts the military campaign of Pharoah Seti I
(figure A) against the Hittites and Libyans
1.129 Jan van Eyck,
Madonna in a Church,
1437–8. Oil on wood panel,
12 5/8 x 5 1/2”.
Gemäldegalerie, Staatliche
Museen, Berlin, Germany
PART 1
FUNDAMENTALS
Jan van Eyck,

Madonna in a Church
 Uses hierarchical scale to communicate spiritual
importance
 In his effort to glorify the spiritual importance of Mary
and the Christ child, van Eyck separates them from
normal human existence
 Van Eyck has scaled them to symbolize their central
importance in the Christian religion
PART 1
FUNDAMENTALS
Distorted Scale
 An artist may deliberately distort scale to create an
abnormal or supernatural effect
PART 1
FUNDAMENTALS
Distorted Scale
1.130 Dorothea Tanning, Eine Kleine Nachtmusik, 1943. Oil on canvas, 16 1/8 x 24”. Tate, London
PART 1
FUNDAMENTALS
Dorothea Tanning,
Eine Kleine Nachtmusik
 Dorothea Tanning was a Surrealist artist
 The sunflower seems huge in relation to the interior
architecture and the two female figures standing on the left
 By contradicting our ordinary experience of scale, Tanning
invites us into a world unlike the one we know
 Eine Kleine Nachtmusik (“A Little Night Music”), is
borrowed from a lighthearted piece of music by the
composer Mozart, but ironically Tanning’s scene exhibits a
strange sense of dread
PART 1
FUNDAMENTALS
Proportion
 The relationships between the sizes of different parts of a
work make up its proportions
 By controlling these size relationships an artist can
enhance the expressive and descriptive characteristics of
the work
PART 1
FUNDAMENTALS
Proportion
PART 1
FUNDAMENTALS
Lip
Hip
Height Width
A B C
Foot
1.131 Examples of how proportion changes on vertical and horizontal

axes
PART 1
FUNDAMENTALS
Human Proportion
 Carefully chosen proportion can make an art object seem
pleasing to the eye
This goes for the human body, too
 The ancient Egyptians used the palm of the hand as a unit
of measurement
 The ancient Greeks sought an ideal of beauty in the
principle of proportion
 The models used by the Greeks for calculating human
proportion were later adopted by artists of ancient Rome,
and then by Renaissance artists
PART 1
FUNDAMENTALS
Human Proportion
PART 1
FUNDAMENTALS
4 fingers = 1 palm
6 palms = 1 cubit 4 cubits = 1 man’s height

[24 palms]
1.132 Ancient Egyptian system using the human hand as a standard unit of
measurement
1.133 Nigerian Ife artist,
Figure of Oni, early 14th–
15th century. Brass with
lead, 18 3/8” high. National
Museum, Ife, Nigeria
PART 1
FUNDAMENTALS
Nigerian Ife artist,

Figure of Oni
 The Oni is the most powerful and important figure in this
culture
 The head is large in proportion to the rest of the body; the
Yoruba believe that the head is the seat of a divine power
 Many African sculptures exaggerate the head and face as a
way to communicate status, destiny, and a connection to
the spiritual
1.134 Raphael, The School of Athens, 1510–11. Fresco, 16’ 8” x 25’. Stanza della Segnatura, Vatican City
Chapter 1 Art in Two Dimensions: Line, Shape, and the Principle of
Contrast
PART 1
FUNDAMENTALS
Gateway to Art:
Raphael, The School of Athens
Scale and Proportion in a Renaissance Masterpiece
 Raphael’s sensitivity to proportion reflects his pursuit of
perfection
 He indicated the importance of his masterpiece by creating it
on a magnificent scale
 He composed the individual figures so that the parts of each
figure are harmonious in relation to each other and portray
an idealized form
 Double emphasis on the center brings our attention to the
opposing gestures of two famous Greek philosophers, Plato
and Aristotle
PART 1
FUNDAMENTALS
The Golden Section

 The Golden Section is a proportional ratio of 1:1.618,
which occurs in many natural objects
 Real human bodies do not have exactly these proportions,
but when the ratio 1:1.618 is applied to making statues, it
gives naturalistic results
 The proportions of Ancient Greek sculptures are often
very close to the Golden Section
PART 1
FUNDAMENTALS
Golden Section & Proportion
PART 1
FUNDAMENTALS
5
8
1 1 √5
3 2 2
1.618…
1.618 13
1/2
Golden Mean Fibonacci Sequence

1:1.6180337... 1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13, … 2.236…
1:1.6180337... Root 5 Rectangle
1.135 The Golden Section

1.136 Poseidon (or Zeus), c.
460–450 BCE. Bronze, 6’ 10
1/2” high. National
Archaeological Museum,
Athens, Greece
1.618
1.137 Diagram of
proportional formulas used
in the statue

PART 1
FUNDAMENTALS
Poseidon
 As a Greek god, Poseidon had to have perfect proportions

 The sculptor applied a conveniently simple ratio, using the
head as a standard measurement
 The body is three heads wide by seven heads high
PART 1
FUNDAMENTALS
Proportional Ratios
 “Golden Rectangles” is a technique based on nesting inside
each other a succession of rectangles based on the 1:1.618
proportions of the Golden Section
 The shorter side of the outer rectangle becomes the longer side of
the smaller rectangle inside it, and so on
 The result is an elegant spiral shape
1.138a Henry Peach Robinson, Fading Away, 1858. Combination albumen print. George Eastman House, Rochester, New York
1.138b Proportional analysis of Henry Peach Robinson’s Fading Away
PART 1
FUNDAMENTALS
Henry Peach Robinson,

Fading Away
 Henry Peach Robinson was a great photographic
innovator
 This image shows Robinson’s attention to the coordinated
ratios in artistic composition
 Notice how the right-hand drape divides the photograph
into two Golden Rectangles, and how the spiral draws our
eye to the dying young woman
1.139 Iktinos and Kallikrates, Parthenon, 447–432 BCE. Athens, Greece
PART 1
FUNDAMENTALS
Iktinos and Kallikrates, Parthenon
 By applying the idealized rules of proportion for the

human body to the design of the Parthenon, a temple of the
goddess Athena, the Greeks created a harmonious design
 The proportions correspond quite closely to the Golden
Section
 The vertical and horizontal measurements work together to
create proportional harmony
Triglyphs
Pediment
1.140 The use of the Golden Section in the design of the Parthenon
PART 1
FUNDAMENTALS
Conclusion
 When proportion conforms to scale, all the parts of the
work look the way we expect them to
 Scale and proportion are basic to most works; size choices
influence all the other elements and principles in the design
PART 1
FUNDAMENTALS
This concludes the PowerPoint Slide Set for Chapter 1.7
Gateways to Art: Understanding the Visual Arts

By Debra J DeWitte, Ralph M Larmann, M Kathryn Shields

1.07 PPoint Lecture

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PART 1

Copyright © 2011 Thames & Hudson

 Usually, an artist ensures that all the parts of an object are

Scale and Meaning

Scale and Meaning

Click to start the Interactive Exercises

Claes Oldenburg and Coosje van Bruggen,

 Uses monumental scale to poke fun while expressing

Click to start the Interactive Exercises

Hierarchical scale: Relief from the

Jan van Eyck,

Click to start the Interactive Exercises

Click to start the Interactive Exercises

1.131 Examples of how proportion changes on vertical and horizontal

Click to start the Interactive Exercises

6 palms = 1 cubit 4 cubits = 1 man’s height

Nigerian Ife artist,

The Golden Section

Golden Section & Proportion

Click to start the Interactive Exercises

Golden Mean Fibonacci Sequence

1:1.6180337... Root 5 Rectangle

1.135 The Golden Section

Copyright © 2011 Thames & Hudson

 As a Greek god, Poseidon had to have perfect proportions

Henry Peach Robinson,

Iktinos and Kallikrates, Parthenon

 By applying the idealized rules of proportion for the

This concludes the PowerPoint Slide Set for Chapter 1.7

Gateways to Art: Understanding the Visual Arts

Copyright © 2011 Thames & Hudson

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